Briars Round the Heart
by stefanie bean
Summary: Ana Lucia may be the one Libby's been looking for. But Ana's preoccupation with revenge may drive them apart.
1. Love

**If you are unfamiliar with LOST_: _**_En route from Sydney to Los Angeles, Oceanic Flight 815 crashes on an uncharted Pacific island. The survivors struggle with their troubled pasts, their inner demons, each other, and malevolent Island entities and people bent on their destruction. Forty-eight survivors from the middle section of the plane crash-land on the beach, where they are relatively safe and provided for. The plane's tail section breaks off and falls into the water on the other side of the Island. _

_The "Tailies" have a terrible time of it, with many injuries, almost no resources, and multiple kidnappings by the hostile Island inhabitants called **"The Others."** The Tailies are led by **Ana Lucia Cortez**, an LAPD cop, and **Libby Smith**, a clinical psychologist. (Libby and Ana are not lovers in canon, although this story follows canon very tightly, and thus it "could have" happened this way.) In their group are also found **Mr. Eko**, a Nigerian drug-runner posing as a Catholic priest; flight attendant **Cindy Chandler**; a passenger named **Nathan** who chafes under Ana Lucia's iron rule; the kindly, grandfatherly dentist **Bernard**, and two children, **Emma** and **Zach**, who were flying to meet their mother in LA. Also present is** Goodwin**, an infiltrator from The Others, sent by his leader **Benjamin Linus** to spy on the Tailies, who is later killed by Ana Lucia._

_In canon, Libby is the brief love interest of **Hugo "Hurley" Reyes:** "gentle giant," psychic, and former mental patient (who was hospitalized in the same institution as Libby.) During Libby and Hugo's brief time together, Hugo is beset by disturbing visions, including one entity who tries to talk him into killing himself; he is saved by Libby. I__n canon, Libby and Ana Lucia both meet violent deaths at the hand of **Michael Dawson**, one of the castaways who becomes unhinged when The Others kidnap his son. In this story, I've left it open-ended as to whether or not Ana and Libby survive._

**If you are familiar with LOST_,_**_ this story takes place between "The Other 48 Days" (2x07) and "Two for the Road" (2x20.) Libby and Ana's affair is my own invention._

* * *

**Chapter 1: Love**

After the Oceanic 815 tail section disappears into the waves, after the screaming stops, while the man with the splinted fracture lies moaning under the ironwood tree, two exhausted women sit together on the sand.

"Good job," the dark-haired one says, pointing over to the man with the fracture. The first hint of a smile crosses her warm brown eyes.

"Just did what I could," says the dark-blonde woman with windswept hair. Tired lines lace her green eyes. She's a little wary, because the other woman looks tough, maybe even mean. But there's a kindness about her, too.

The dark-haired woman holds out her hand, offering a strong, calloused grip. "I'm Ana Lucia."

"Libby." It's hard to sound friendly, but Libby does her best. Ana Lucia must have some kind of physical job. Truck driver, maybe, or prison guard. Perhaps orderly in a hospital, and this give Libby a cold little shiver despite the hot tropical sun.

"So, you're a shrink," Ana Lucia says.

Just barely, Libby thinks. With the CEUs she's earned from the Sydney conference, and a good report from Dr. Brooks at the Santa Rosa hospital, she just might manage to get her California license reinstated. Not feeling like going into it, Libby just nods. "And you?"

"I'm a cop. LAPD. You from LA?"

"Newport Beach. How about yourself?"

"Ha, nowhere so nice. You probably never heard of it."

So it begins.

* * *

The first night, three of their company are dragged from the fireside and swallowed by the darkness. For a few of the attackers, their luck ends on the sand, where they lie bludgeoned to death by Eko, the huge Nigerian priest. His blood-soaked shirt scares the two children, Zach and Emma, so he removes it.

Normally, enormous muscle-bound men terrify Libby, but not Eko. After the attack, he moves like a silent, protective cloud over and around all of them.

The next night, the tail section survivors bed down in clumps. Ana Lucia, Libby, and the flight attendant named Cindy put the children between them. The women joke about who's going to be the odd one on the outside.

Cindy says that she doesn't mind being the bread of the sandwich, as long as she gets the side by the fire. So Libby forms one open parenthesis with the children on the inside, and Ana Lucia closes it with the other, with Cindy huddled up against Libby.

That night, Libby stretches out her arm over Zach's head. All at once, her hand collides with another one in the dark, and rough, strong fingers lace around her own. Neither Libby nor Ana let go until first light.

* * *

They've never said that they're together, but other people in the group look at them differently now. Then horror breaks out again, even worse than the first night, because this time Emma and Zach are taken, and seven others besides.

Cindy blames herself and cries inconsolably, shaking off Libby's hand when Libby tries to comfort her. Libby stares at Eko when he isn't looking, wondering who these people are, how even a man of Eko's size and power can't stop them.

The group abandons the beach the next morning, and heads inland.

* * *

Now, with the children gone, Ana and Libby lie entwined all night under their covers of palm-fronds, Ana's head pillowed on Libby's breast. Despite herself, despite all that's happened, the happiness rises in Libby's throat so hard and fast that she can scarcely breathe.

In the day, though, there's a price. They've come to a spot in the jungle where a clear stream flows, where the trees are covered with fruit, and there they settle. Libby is Ana's lieutenant now, and Ana has had some hard decisions to make.

"I need you behind me," Ana says. "You know that everything I do is to keep you safe. You and everyone else."

* * *

Sometimes at night, Libby imagines that silent feet glide through the night-time jungle, that rough hands snatch her right out of Ana's arms before she even has time to scream. Then she leans in close to Ana, taking comfort in her presence. If Ana's awake, Libby presses her mouth up against hers, first lightly, then with more passion as Ana kisses her back.

They can lie like that for hours under cover of darkness, tasting each other's mouths, sharing each other's breath. It's been almost three weeks since the crash, and neither of them has had a shower or brushed their teeth. Everyone else is pretty rank too, so no one notices. To Libby, though, Ana Lucia smells and tastes like heaven.

* * *

It's hard not to leave Cindy out, but it can't be helped. Libby wonders if Cindy's jealous, and just hiding it well. Libby's noticed, too, that Cindy has started sleeping on the edge of their group, alone. One night, when Libby gets up in the middle of the night to relieve herself, she sees a vague, shadowy figure squatting near Cindy, who's rolled up in a bed of thick dried leaves. She hears whispering, and then with eyes glinting red in the low firelight, Cindy looks over at Libby. The dark shape seems to melt into the underbrush, and Cindy curls up in her leafy nest once more, her back to Libby and Ana.

Libby crawls in next to Ana, snuggling up to her warmth. She thinks about telling Ana what she saw, then forgets about it, because Ana does something new, something she hasn't tried before. She places her hand on Libby's breast and caresses it for a moment. Then, she caresses Libby's neck, aimless at first, then more directed, as she unties Libby's halter dress at the neck. She lowers the bodice and finds Libby's nipple, tender at first as Ana rolls it in her fingers, then crinkled and hard. So there's nothing else for Libby to do but slide up Ana's tank top and return the compliment.

Ana's flesh is firm just about everywhere, roped with muscle, but her soft breasts roll gently under Libby's hands. One thing leads to another as they loosen each other's pants, but they don't dare take them off, just as they always sleep with their shoes on. Who knows what might come out of the forest in the dead of night?

Libby slides her fingers through the opening of Ana's low-rise jeans, taking her mouth off of Ana's breast long enough to whisper, "Is this OK?" Of course it is, and under their palm-leaf covers they rock to the slow drum-line beat of each other's touch, until they forget they're on an Island in the middle of nowhere, and in more trouble than they could ever imagine.

* * *

Things go from bad to worse with Nathan, the man who chafes under Ana Lucia's leadership. One morning he strolls past Ana and Libby, and in a half-whisper says to them, "Could you two be a little louder? Some of us need a bit more fantasy material to get us through a long and lonely night."

Ana's face grows dark with blood, and her eyes bright with murder. Afraid, Libby lays a restraining arm on Ana's shoulder and looks to Eko for help. But Eko still isn't talking, and he just walks on by, glowering and silent.

Ana Lucia begins digging a hole. Eventually Libby joins her.

* * *

Later, Libby wonders why she did it, why she went along with Ana's fears, maybe even planted a few seeds of her own. "He creeps me out." "I didn't see him on the plane." And when Cindy agrees, it just seems so easy to fall in with Ana, to ignore Bernard and Goodwin's objections. To forget Eko's silent, hulking presence, and how he stares at Ana as if he can see right into her soul.

"Maybe we should let Nathan out," Libby finally says, swallowing her fear, because Ana has become increasingly angry and short-tempered with her recently. For a second, Libby imagines herself down in that pit, too. She knows she's taking a fatal, irreversible step, but she says it anyway. "They haven't come back. Maybe they've gone away."

"Like you said, Libby, they haven't come back since he's been down there."

Libby has no answer. That night, Ana doesn't crawl in next to her. Instead, she sleeps on the other side of their group, next to Goodwin.

* * *

The next morning, Nathan is dead, his neck snapped. The murderous jungle strangers aren't done with them yet, it seems. So the camp moves again.

Nathan's death seems to have released something inside Ana. Once again she joins Libby's side at night, and their sweetness in the dark resumes. Ana seems insatiable now, manic. She clutches Libby to her breast and groans in release, not caring who hears them any more.

Their small band heads back downhill, downstream, always down. Even though there's no hurry in their steps, Ana sets a relentless pace. By the third day, Libby is limp and exhausted from trying to keep up.

At night, with only seven of them to cluster around the campfire now, Ana Lucia begins sharpening a stick to a fine point, almost invisible.

Later on, after midnight, Ana whispers to Libby, "I think I was wrong."

"Wrong about what?" Libby says, her final orgasm still pulsing through her body as she slides down the slalom course to sleep.

"Nathan. I won't make that mistake again."

Libby closes her eyes. She hasn't felt so helpless since the day she checked herself into the mental hospital.

* * *

They sleep in a new place, a concrete bunker carved into the hillside. There's a weird sign on the wall, an eight-sided sigil with an arrow in the center. Cindy says it's called a "bagua," some Chinese symbol, but no one cares. They're too busy with the day-to-day elements of survival: resting their tired feet from the long forced march, foraging for fruit, or catching small fish from the rocky and fast-moving river.

No one questions Ana when Goodwin disappears, least of all Libby. Sometimes Libby and Cindy exchange furtive glances. And sometimes Cindy's gone for a long time, alone in the jungle. At first Libby thinks she's looking for the children. But sometimes she's not so sure.

Libby can tell that Ana feels safe, because she doesn't monitor people's movements anymore. Even when Cindy's gone almost half a morning, Ana doesn't say anything, as long as Cindy brings back something to eat. Now that the only men left are Bernard and Eko, Ana seems to relax. She doesn't care what they do, just as she doesn't question Cindy.

For Libby, the days start to blur, and she loses track of how long they've been here. It seems as if she's always been with Ana Lucia, always been covered in sweat and jungle grime, always played the role of the calm and uncritical one, while Ana simmers, thinks, calculates.

But something must torment Ana in the long watches of the night, and Libby knows too well how that goes. So when Ana turns to her and whispers, "I did it for us. You and me. All I want is for us to be safe," Libby waits with leaping heart for the train to stop at the next station, for Ana to take the next step, to say the next words for which Libby hopes.

Libby has fallen in love.

* * *

When it falls apart, it tears fast as a seam ripping under the strain. Ana's gone to the river for water, but doesn't return, so Libby goes after her. There, from behind a thick brake of fern, she sees Eko and Ana talking at the river's edge.

Libby barely has time to get over the shock of Eko speaking after six weeks of silence, but then another blow comes down, even sharper and harder. Biting her lip, she watches from behind the bracken as Ana collapses into tears. The jealousy hits hard, like a surprise blow from behind. Eko's done nothing to deserve those tears, the tears which Ana refuses to shed for Libby, even in Libby's arms, even when Libby tries so hard to draw her out, to succor her.

Ana cries in Eko's arms, and he embraces her, strokes her hair, whispers in his lilting, musical accent, while Ana clings to him like a life-raft. Silently Libby slips back into the verdant shadows, eyes stinging with tears.

* * *

Libby spends most of her time with Cindy now. Cindy knows what Libby's going through, but even after seven weeks in this green hell, Cindy still keeps up the smiling, professional facade, as does Libby. Both of them have made their livings hiding their true feelings about passengers or clients. But their eyes say everything, especially when Ana and Eko go hunting together, or Eko carves on his stick as he sits close to Ana in the bunker while rain pours outside, beating on the steel door like a drum.

No one wants to know why the word "Quarantine" is stenciled across the inside.

Libby feels quarantined herself, as if she's been locked outside of something vital between the two of them, Ana and Eko. She moves through the days like a ghost, and occasionally the old feelings come back. Depersonalization. Derealization. Knowing their clinical names doesn't rob them of their power. Knowing what has brought Eko and Ana together isn't helping, either.

Ana and Eko aren't sleeping together, Libby's sure of that. But something binds them even closer than what she and Ana had.

Mutual guilt over shed blood.

* * *

They come across the three strange men with their outlandish story of having first been in the plane crash, then shipwrecked. Ana and Eko make everyone drag their captives back to their old camp, where they dump the new men into the pit which Ana and Libby dug for Nathan. Libby has no voice in the matter.

It seems like months ago, years even, that Ana and Libby rocked in each others arms. Ana and Eko concoct their schemes, their brutalities, and all Libby can do is suffer. She stops talking to Cindy, to everyone, really. The days roll by like scenes from a movie, a nightmarish horror film.

Libby starts cataloging her symptoms as if they were happening to someone else, and indeed it feels as if they are. She snaps in and out of it, especially when it's clear that the tall blond man, Sawyer, is getting progressively sicker and weaker. The sight of his pus-swollen, red-streaked bullet wound brings her back to herself, if only for a few moments.

She's got enough mental clarity to lie to him, shamelessly. His wound doesn't look fine at all, despite what she tells him. In fact, it looks like he may well die of it. But there's no point in telling him that. If he dies, it will be soon enough.

Ana wants to leave Sawyer behind, but when she looks to Eko for support, all he does is turn his face away.

For Eko has become Ana's second-in-command now. Libby would resent him more if she weren't so busy trying to hold together the remaining shreds of her sanity. For the closer they get to Sawyer's camp, carrying him now because he can no longer walk, the more Libby feels this deep oppression, this weight hanging over all of them.

She begins to wonder once more what it would feel like to die.

* * *

They're dragging Sawyer's limp-as-a-corpse body uphill when Cindy disappears. The jungle answers their shouts of terror and frustration with a resounding rainstorm. They follow the direction they think Cindy's gone, slipping in the mud, clawing at each other in the blinding fog.

Then, when the thunderclouds themselves seem to clot into voices, Libby is convinced she's lost her mind for good. Now she can hear words in the whispers which hover around the tree-tops, words which mock and warn and insinuate.

Then, swiftly and without warning, from out of the black jungle a pale ghost streaks towards them. The whispers fill Libby's ear with a dull roar. Half-hidden by the downpour, thin and white, the flapping shape shrieks something no one can understand.

Ana Lucia fires off a single shot, and a thin, blonde woman falls to the ground, blood spurting in great arterial surges from the hole in her mid-section. Right behind her, a rain-soaked dark-skinned man bellows curses and lamentations as he charges at them.

* * *

Libby's mind clears. The dark-skinned man lies at Ana's feet, unconscious from a blow to the head. Ana orders Eko to tie him up, but he refuses.

Everyone gapes at Ana Lucia now, who swings the pistol around towards Libby. Long-standing practice forces Libby to control her breathing, still her trembling hands, count to five. The numbness of the past two days probably saves her life.

"Ana," Libby says with a tenderness she doesn't feel.

Ana can't even look her in the eye.

"Ana," she says again, and Ana almost relents, but then something hard and crazy inside her snaps back into position. Suddenly, Libby doesn't really want to die after all. Deep down, she knows that Ana will shoot her if she makes a false move, even though Ana has let Eko step back from this scene of horror.

So Libby does as Ana orders and ties him up, while Ana trains her weapon on them both. For the first time Libby's anger overflows. She's filled with jealous rage at Eko's lack of fear in the face of death, as well as resenting the hold he has over Ana, while Libby obviously has none.

Suddenly, Eko looms over Ana and stares at her, the two of them engaged in some titanic struggle which Libby can only witness without understanding. Then Eko hoists Sawyer onto his shoulders, and strides off. He is taking Sawyer to his camp, Eko announces.

The dark man wakes up, and in the furor which follows, he says exactly what Libby is thinking. "She is alone, with her guilt and a gun."

Bernard is the first to break. Taking Libby's arm, he starts to walk out of the clearing, out of Ana's sight, following the wide swath of broken foliage left in Eko's wake. Libby follows Bernard blindly, yet before she disappears into the forest, she turns around to give Ana one drawn-out, hopeful look.

But Ana Lucia's eyes are flat and blank as stones at the river's edge.

(_continued_)


	2. Interlude

**Chapter 2: Interlude**

Libby clings to Bernard's hand as they enter the settlement. Soon Bernard leaves her standing, though, because his wife grabs him, sobbing, crying, kissing and hugging him. For a moment, Libby wonders if she'll find someone like that to grow old with.

Far across the beach camp, the tall, dark man with the volcanic expression cradles the dead girl in his arms.

* * *

Libby makes a bedroll by the fire in front of Rose's tent. Bernard and Rose are giving each other distinctive married looks, so Libby makes a big show of bedding down for the night.

Bernard goes into the tent, but Rose hangs back for a moment. "Did you get to meet Hurley?"

Most people have said their names to Libby in passing, but that one doesn't stick out. "Was he here when we came in?"

"Tell you the truth, honey, I didn't notice. But if you'd met him, you wouldn't forget him."

"Is that so?" Libby says, polite.

A strange tone comes into Rose's voice, but Libby doesn't know Rose well enough to decipher it. "Now that I think of it, that boy's been spending a lot of time out in the jungle. I'm sure we'll see him tomorrow, though."

Libby doesn't say anything. She thinks of mentioning what happened to Cindy, but doesn't. To do so would open a whole line of speculation, and Libby's tired, tired to the bone. She and Ana are already in enough trouble as it is.

Rose finishes with, "Guess it's just as well. When he finds out about Shannon, it's gonna really hit him. Hurley takes things hard."

* * *

At Shannon's funeral, Libby keeps peeking around Rose and Bernard to get a better look at Hurley. He's pure endomorph, a 7-1-1 on the somatotype scale if there ever was one, which is probably why Rose said he's unforgettable. That, and his wild hair. But there's something terribly familiar about him, something which Libby can't place, and a deep-seated anxiety rides shotgun alongside that familiarity.

Afterwards, a smiling girl named Sirrah shows Libby where the extra clothes are kept. Maybe she'd like to change? At once Libby notices how clean these people are. Sure, they're sweat-soaked and their jean hems are ringed with mud, but Libby's been covered in thick grime for so long that everyone here looks freshly-scrubbed.

The beach camp people have suitcases, so many suitcases, and Libby has to fight back envy as she sorts through the clothing. When Ana and she crashed, they had nothing. Their few suitcases floated out to sea, carried away by the tide.

* * *

Ana collects thick fallen branches, then ties them together with cordage. She doesn't look in Libby's direction. All she says is, "Better get your shelter made."

Libby knows a dismissal when she hears one. But she tries anyway. "Listen, Ana, I know you want some space right now. If you want to talk, I just want you to know that-"

"Libby, I'm gonna say this once. Do _not_ pull that headshrinker shit on me."

It's like being slapped. Libby's mouth is still hanging open when a big woman with gray-blonde hair and a long hippie dress approaches them, carrying a tarp. Her name is Kathy, and her dark-skinned, long-haired friend is Shana.

When Kathy holds out the tarp, it's clear that she's not sure who to hand it to. _She's trying to figure out if we're a couple_, Libby thinks in the midst of the deafening silence which surrounds her and Ana. Finally Ana directs a curt nod towards Libby. "Give it to her."

Shana hands Libby a ball of twine to tie her tent-frame together. Libby almost can't say thanks, because her eyes sting so sharply with tears.

Then Ana walks away, over to where Eko is camped. Her half-finished tent sits mute, unoccupied.

After staring at the tarp for awhile, Libby starts to gather long, straight branches for a tent frame, just like Ana did. Ten minutes later, it's clear how rough this is going to be, for Libby's never camped a day in her life. The closest was when David took her to Egg Harbor, where the "rustic cabin" was more luxurious than their Newport Beach condo.

She misses how easy it was at day's end to just roll into a leaf-nest with Ana. Here there are limits, customs, unspoken rules, alliances. A settlement, in other words. A society. And she's completely alone within it.

* * *

A midnight rain convinces Libby she has to finish her tent. It's easier said than done, though. The tarp-roof's fallen down for the third time, and if a single person could tie it up securely, Libby doesn't know the secret. Inside, tears build up again. It's crazy, she never cried once during the past month and a half, yet she's almost collapsed into a blubbering heap twice in as many days.

She knows why, intellectually. Clients in therapy would break down in front of Libby all the time, simply because they felt safe to do so. Now it's Libby's turn to feel safe, even though it doesn't make her happy. She doesn't want to cry in front of these people.

One more try, then.

Libby stretches the tarp, and the other corner slides down again. Numb with fatigue, racked by frustration, she doesn't see him until he's almost upon her. He strides up with a goofy smile on his round face, then silently picks up the runaway tarp corner. Automatically, she supports it from the other side.

Hurley. He looks like a great boy in his surfer shorts and sloppy t-shirt. His sneakers are big as canoes. She feels his size, even from six feet away. When he bends over, his body squeezes into shapeless folds.

How does someone that young get so big? Libby has always prided herself on her control, her discipline, on keeping her weight down to what it was in high school.

She can't help being warmed by his smile, though. No one else in this camp has acted as glad to see her. The urge to cry fades.

He finishes tying off the tarp, still beaming. She can smell the virginity on him, sweet and fresh as new-mown grass.

* * *

A few days go by, but Hurley hasn't come around again. Out of the corner of her eye, though, Libby catches him watching her.

She goes to collect crabs in a tide pool out of sight of the beach camp.

Picking her way silently across the sand, Ana comes up and puts her arms around Libby from behind. At first Libby's too shocked to speak, then she falls into the embrace. Ana nuzzles her neck, murmuring things like, "I'm sorry" and "I know it's been rough on you."

Libby wants to believe her, for she's been crushed by the weight of missing Ana. She can't hold in the questions any longer, and the words flood out. "Why? Why are you doing this, Ana? We don't have to be apart. There are already two women who might be a couple-"

Ana cuts her off. "I'm doing this for you. They hate me here. I killed one of their people, did you forget that? At least if I'm not with you, they won't hate you too."

Now Ana's shaking, and Libby pulls her in close. She rubs Ana's back, makes soft murmuring noises. "They won't. You'll see. You just have to give them a chance, Ana."

For once, amazingly, Ana doesn't argue. "You know, they got a bunker here of their own."

"I know. They call it 'the Hatch.'"

Then Ana smiles and says, "You wanna go explore it?"

It sounds almost too good to be true.

* * *

All the way to the Hatch, Ana tries to get Libby to see things her way. The people here are weak. They've been coddled. They're complacent, soft. Against her will, Libby's reminded of Hurley's oleaginous body.

"Jack's the only one that sees it," Ana goes on. "But I've got a plan." A red flush spreads over Ana's cheeks, then down her chest, to cover the tops of her breasts. Ana's pink, excited. She looks the most alive she has, since they've come here.

Only once does Libby say, "Ana, this is crazy."

Ana stops in the middle of the path. "Really? They killed our people. They took the kids. Don't you want them back, Libby? Don't you want Cindy back?"

Of course Libby does.

* * *

At the back door to the Swan Hatch, Ana yells, "Ana Lucia, with one."

John Locke shouts back, "Come on in."

Ana takes Libby's hand. They pass through a dim concrete corridor to what looks like someone's finished basement. "Look, a clothes washer," Ana says. "And a shower. I could use both."

"Why not just get some clothes from the suitcases?"

It's the wrong thing to say. Ana's face grows dark, but not with excitement. "What if I grabbed something of _hers, _Libby? Besides, I don't need their stuff. I just need to clean up."

Libby nods. Ana leads her to a small room off the main one, a kind of store-room, although it has a cot in it as well. One shelf is stacked with coarse wool army blankets. Tossing one to Libby, Ana says, "You look like you could use a shower, too."

"What about Locke?"

"That old coot. He's all wrapped up in his computer." Ana strips, and as she stretches, she gives Libby a long view of her golden skin, round breasts, strong shoulders. Naked, draped in blankets, Libby and Ana tiptoe past Locke. After loading up the washing machine, they head for the shower.

* * *

If there's anything Libby wants to thank some non-existent god for, it's hot water. The shower stall is compact, so they stand plastered together in the soapy stream.

Libby makes the first move. "Want me to wash your back?" She's prepared for rejection, but to her surprise, Ana nods. Libby's hands travel across Ana's strong, broad shoulders, over her tightly-muscled back, down to the soft curves of her bottom.

It's almost too much to take. Libby lays her face against Ana's back, wraps her arms around Ana's slippery middle, not wanting to move or let go. Ana swings around, so that their bodies slide over each other like fish.

"My turn," Ana says. As Ana's hands wander over her, Libby's never been prouder of her body. Forty-plus days of starvation and forced marches have made the bones protrude sharply from her hips. There's no flesh between her thighs, where Ana's hand works its way up the lean, hard arc of Libby's groin.

Her breasts hang a little, not like Ana's fuller, heavier ones, but Libby doesn't care. She hasn't been this slender since eighth grade. She feels beautiful, confident. When Ana turns off the water, Libby's heart leaps at Ana's wicked smirk.

Dripping, they toss the laundry into the dryer, then sneak back to the little room and towel each other off. They've never had genuine privacy, never had a closed door to shut out the world, and for an instant they just stare at each other, not sure of what's coming next.

In a heartbeat, they fall into each other's arms at the same time. Their hungry mouths merge. Libby kisses Ana open-mouthed, tasting Ana's tongue. Ana gently bites Libby's lower lip, bringing it to a peak of swollen sensitivity.

The kiss goes on for a long time. Sometimes they draw in little puffs of air from between each others' mouths, or breathe through their noses, not wanting to break contact. Sometimes they just lick each others' lips, reveling in the taste, the sensitive skin just on the inside.

Before Libby knows it, Ana's thrown the bolt on the door and they're lying together on the cot. They pick up where they left off with more kisses, but Libby isn't content with kisses alone. Not any longer.

The room is hot and soon they're slick with sweat. Libby's mouth wanders down, always farther down, past Ana's beautiful soft breasts, over her ridged stomach, lower still, until Ana shudders with pleasure.

Libby takes her time. She's good at this, she's been told, and she believes it. It's all a matter of timing, of alternating feather-like flicks with slow, long strokes, of not going too fast, of letting the tension build right up to the very last instant.

Ah, that's it. Libby hasn't lost her touch at all. The walls of that small room ring out with Ana's cries, ones she's never made before. Then her breathing slows, her eyes open, and the warm, welcoming smile Ana sends her way is for Libby alone.

Soon Ana can speak again. "I bet those clothes are dry by now."

Libby laughs, full of delight. Finally, she's been able to make Ana Lucia happy.

* * *

Libby starts doing laundry for people, in exchange for fish. It makes her feel useful and wanted. It also gives her an excuse to spend time in the Hatch, where she and Ana catch their stolen hours here and there.

So one morning, while doing laundry, Libby's heart leaps when she hears the familiar "click" of the Hatch's back door. It's not Ana, though. Instead, Hurley has followed her in.

She's used to men eyeing her. She catches his side-looks, but they're not the usual kind. Instead, he seems to search for something, yet won't come right out with it.

At first, she doesn't know what to say to him. His shy awkwardness unnerves her. By the time she starts prattling about the washing machine, she's flailing inside like a drowning woman. He's just a kid, he has to be twenty-five at the most. Maybe younger. He makes every one of her thirty-six years weigh on her.

Her sense of desperation grows. For the first time in a long while she wants some Xanax, very badly. She can almost taste the tablets dissolving into bitterness under her tongue, followed by the rush of calm, immediate as throwing a switch. It's as if she hasn't learned a thing from her stint in the hospital, or in rehab.

There's no Xanax here, though, so she's on her own. At first flirting derails him, keeps him staring at her breasts instead of her face. Now, though, he's not side-eyeing her anymore. Instead, he scrutinizes her openly under the harsh fluorescent lights.

"Don't I... know you?"

It's true. He does, she does, from somewhere, but she can't make it out, doesn't want to. It has to be the hospital. Not rehab, that was all women. He's big enough to have been an orderly, though she can't picture him in an orderly's whites. A visitor, maybe...

Something inside her shuts down the speculation. Instead she babbles, teases him about not peeking while she undresses. She changes into an ugly sequined top grabbed at random from the clothes pile, and lies about him stepping on her foot when they were on the plane.

It works. She can't see his face, but his whole body flinches. He's forgotten his question. When he turns around, he stares at her breasts again, but she has to drag the compliments out of him.

Hastily, he stuffs his unfolded laundry into a back-pack and leaves.

* * *

Later that night, Ana and Libby lie wrapped in each others arms, snug in the Hatch.

Ana's half-asleep, limp with relaxation, so Libby dares to bring something up.

"Ana, we could leave."

"Hmm?"

"Grab some gear, take off. The people in those tents behind me, they've been talking about it. They don't think I can hear them, but I do. They're going to leave, sometime soon. We could do that, too. Go look for Cindy and the kids."

"Sure, Libby. Walk right into the jaws of those animals out there. Brilliant."

She swallows, hard. "Ana, I could work something out with them. Negotiate. I'm good at that."

Ana laughs, cold and without humor. She's fully awake now. "You shrinks, you talk somebody down off a ledge, you think you can do anything."

"I've done it before. Only it wasn't a ledge. It was a pier." It's true. She still has the commendation from the Orange County sheriff's department on the wall in her office.

It's clear Ana's thinking about it. She doesn't argue anymore, just rolls over and starts nuzzling Libby's breasts. Before Libby loses herself in soft, rolling sensation, she tells herself that at least Ana didn't say no.

* * *

Ana has been spending so much time with Jack, planning some kind of attack against the Others, that the beach camp gossip pegs them having an affair, which makes Libby chuckle. Since the fire, Claire's scraggly-haired ex named Charlie has been sleeping down at Mr. Eko's camp, which sets off another round of speculation, equally untrue. Probably.

Ana's right, too, about the two of them avoiding being seen together. Most in the beach camp either glare at Ana or cut her dead, but that's not the case with Libby. People sometimes invite her to sit at their fire now, mostly Rose and Bernard, or Sun when Jin isn't around. Not Kate, though, nor Claire.

Kathy and Shana invite her too, but Libby hangs back, hesitant. Jack she can fool. Locke's oblivious. Charlie's obsessed with Mr. Eko.

These two, though, seem to see everything. After Libby's second refusal, Shana says, "You don't have to hide, you know. Kathy and I, we're out. Mostly everybody here's cool with that."

Kathy laughs, rich and deep from the belly. "And if they're not, too bad."

Flushing, Libby pretends she doesn't know what they're talking about.

* * *

It's late at night, the night before the prisoner Henry Gale is taken, the night before the Hatch becomes off-limits to all but a favored few. The night before everything changes.

Ana and Libby walk back to the beach camp from the Hatch. Bold, drunk with love, they're looped in each other's arms. They step from the jungle onto a deserted stretch of beach, but someone's built a fire there, in a spot where no one usually does.

They stop dead. They've almost tripped over Hurley, who's crouched over, trying to read in the firelight. He doesn't stir, doesn't seem to know they've crept up behind him.

Slowly, silently, Ana and Libby back up. When they're clear, Ana makes a wry face. Suppressing their giggles, they slip back into the darkness.

(_continued_)


	3. Quietus

**Chapter 3: Quietus**

Libby's still shaking from Claire's shrieks. Kate fires one long, regretful look at Libby before leading her friend away in a protective embrace.

It was stupid to try and hypnotize Claire like that. Stupid and unprofessional. But the girl was so insistent, so obviously troubled by something she probably would do better off forgetting. She has steel inside, though. Under the soft, kittenish exterior, there's something hard and unyielding. Libby admires that, because she knows she has so little of it inside herself.

Now both Kate and Claire have left the beach, and Libby wonders if they're out looking for stolen moments of their own. It wouldn't surprise her.

From her tent, Libby has a view of the seashore, where Sun does the baby-dance as she walks Aaron back and forth. Sometimes if he fusses, she stops to give him a little coconut-water, which he sucks off her finger.

Libby's already making plans for when she and Ana get out of here. They could live in LA. To hell with the condo in Newport Beach. Too many memories there, anyway. Her re-opened practice. Perhaps a child. She's not too old, herself. Lots of women have babies in their late thirties. Maybe Ana would want one, too.

Ana sticks her head in Libby's tent, breaking her speculations. "Take a walk?"

That pink flush of excitement covers Ana's cheeks again. She leans in to Libby and whispers, "We got one of them. Sayid caught one of those bastards."

* * *

The next morning, Libby runs hard up and down the shore, until she reaches a disembodied state of exhaustion. While she sits panting before one of the fires, Ana joins her. It's a first, and Libby basks in the moment. Then Ana announces, "No more fun in the Hatch."

When Libby's face falls, Ana adds, "It's not that I don't want you there. But it's not safe."

Lowering her voice, not wanting to be overheard, Libby leans in close to Ana. "We survived all those attacks after the crash. We caught one of their spies. You think I'm scared of them? I'm not. Look, Ana, let me talk to him. You know, good cop, bad cop."

It's the wrong thing to say. Ana's eyes narrow. "Do I tell you how to shrink heads?"

"No, Ana, it's just-"

"I'm not gonna be around much. Locke, Jack, they're complete amateurs. At least Sayid needs me. But it's gonna take time. Gotta keep up the pressure."

"Sure. I understand."

Libby also understands why so many wives of cops seek therapy.

* * *

Ana strides off, cocky and full of purpose. Alone, Libby pokes the camp fire, where a gull egg wrapped in a wet banana leaf slowly bakes. She surveys the cheerful beach camp, busy in the morning sunlight. Claire nurses Aaron while Kate cuts up fish and hands pieces to Claire, who eats them one-handed. Neither of them have spoken to her since that botched hypnotism.

Mr. Eko and Charlie are sawing away at newly-hewn trees. People are already asking them when the new Starbucks will open.

The girl with the funny fleece hat has her arm around the chubby guy with coke-bottle glasses. Rose laughs at one of Bernard's jokes. Libby can't see Kathy and Shana's camp from where she sits, but they've been acting weird these days, not talking to anyone except their close friends.

Sawyer catches her looking around, and gives her a crooked leer. Libby turns away quickly, glances up the other direction of the beach. Anything but that. Not even if she were starving. She'll walk into the ocean first.

Somebody's made a Frisbee out of cork. A few hundred feet up the beach, Hurley stands in the surf, tossing it to Vincent. The dog lopes after it as if he's not that interested, but does it anyway just to humor Hurley.

Libby throws her egg shells and banana-leaf wrapper into the fire, staring for a few seconds as it burns, deciding.

* * *

Every day it's the same, the repetitious search for a diminishing supply of wild food. Libby reaches into the tide pool, already tasting in her imagination the fat mussels, when a lacerating pain shoots up her hand. It's a sea urchin. She pulls the spine from the tender skin between her thumb and wrist.

The wound starts to throb. She heads back to the beach and almost stumbles into Sun, who doesn't waste any time. With a small knife Sun cuts a neat slit right at the sting, then squeezes, hard. Greenish venom spurts out, but Sun keeps pressing until there's only thin, clear fluid.

"You're going to put Jack out of business," Libby jokes.

Sun doesn't smile. "It needs some medicine." She searches for the word, then finds it. "Antibiotic. You know, salve."

Libby knows where to go, but dread licks her insides as she approaches Sawyer's tent.

"Well, Mrs. Robinson, what can I do you for?" Sawyer says through an impish grin.

Later, when she tells Jack of Sawyer's price for a tube of neosporin, Jack goes into action. The resulting poker game draws a crowd, especially when Kate brings out a pair of binoculars nabbed from the Hatch. Kate and Hurley pass them back and forth, while Jack devastates Sawyer at poker.

Libby sidles up to Hurley, who almost drops the binoculars in surprise. Then, before Kate can take them out of his hand, he hands them to Libby. She tries to ignore the steely glare Kate sends her way. His bare arm brushes Libby's, a brief glow against her skin. He tosses his head and laughs. Because he's so close to her, she can't ignore how good he smells, all warm salt and sunshine.

* * *

In the dead of night, Ana sticks her head into Libby's tent and whispers, "You up for a moonlight ramble?"

They lie together in the tall grass at the outskirts of Sun's vegetable garden, holding hands, tender and affectionate now that passion's spent. It's uncomfortable here on the grassy jungle floor, nowhere near as congenial as their former love-nest in the Hatch. But the garden feels safe even in the dark, protected.

"Ana, do you believe in God?"

"What the hell you talking about, Libby? I'm Catholic."

"So you do believe in God, then."

"I didn't say that." Ana's quiet, thinking. "You Catholic?"

"Episcopalian, high and hazy."

"What's that?"

"Catholic-lite. No purgatory, no Real Presence, no Mary statues. It's all just symbols."

Libby expects Ana to laugh, but the silence which follows is so uncomfortable, she rolls over to look Ana full in the face.

"What's the point, then?" Ana is deadly serious.

Libby tries another approach. "Ana, what do you think happens when we die?"

"Most of us, we go to hell."

Something tears at Libby a little, from the inside.

Now the chuckle's back in Ana's voice. "Not Hurley, though."

Libby flushes, hoping Ana won't see it in the moonlight.

Teasing, Ana goes on. "I bet he never did a mortal sin in his life. One porn pop-up on the screen and bang, he clicks that little red X hard as he can." She leans over, and her tone gets serious again. "Libby, you remember what we talked about. You need a friend down here, for when I'm not around."

Panic seizes Libby. Ana's words sound final, like she's making provisions for something. "What do you mean, when you're not around?"

"We got something on that bastard in the Hatch, something big. I know he's gonna break. He just needs a little more encouragement."

A gut-wrenching sickness joins the panic in Libby's middle. "What do you mean, 'encouragement?'" But Libby already knows.

Ana pretends she didn't hear the question. "In the meantime, I want you taken care of. People here like Hurley, and he won't, you know, bother you."

Libby decides to ask Hurley to go running with her on the beach.

* * *

The next day unfolds like a long, slow nightmare. Night finally falls, covering the beach camp with darkness. Libby lies curled up in her tent, a blanket over her head. She hasn't had a day like this since she checked herself into the Santa Rosa Mental Health Institute. At least the shaking's stopped.

She knows that she saved a life today, and that it was an even bigger deal than what happened at the Newport Beach pier. Then, Libby had the guy back on the sidewalk and calm by the time the rescue boats showed up. Today, if Hurley had gone through with it, actually stepped off that cliff into space, there would have been nothing left at the bottom for the gulls to nibble on.

She almost hadn't followed him into the jungle; that was the kicker. When he'd shouted at her, so loudly that she flinched, she had almost let him go back to the caves on his own.

She doesn't want to think about what would have happened if she had.

Ana was right, too. Hurley didn't even complain when she dodged that second kiss.

* * *

For the next few days, Hurley acts like it never happened.

Rose and Libby chop fruit on a big table made out of a piece of fuselage. With a knowing expression, Rose wants to know when she and Hurley are "going on a picnic." Her tone tells Libby that there's something more beneath the words, so Libby plays dumb.

"You know," Rose says with that same sly suggestiveness. "A boy, a girl, alone on the beach, moonlight-"

"Well..." Libby says, stalling for time. She looks over to Sayid's shelter, where Hurley waves around the short-wave radio which Bernard took from the Arrow bunker. The flesh creeps on her arms, because she strongly suspects Sayid and Hurley are talking about her.

No man has put it inside her since her first husband, and that wasn't very often. The resulting messy divorce led to her dropping out of medical school. By the time she met David, surgery and hormone treatments had already made sex impossible for him.

What a relief. David didn't even mind that she liked women far more than men, and she never took him up on his suggestion that she have an affair or two. They were happy together, comfortable.

Until the cancer came back.

Libby has heard the beach women laugh quietly among themselves when people pair up and want some privacy. That's what they call it here, "going on a picnic."

* * *

No matter how Hurley tries, he can't keep up with Libby at running, so she slows her pace. She keeps darting glances over towards Ana's tent, though. Ana was supposed to come back from the Hatch this morning.

Suddenly, there she is, and what's that, blood on her face?

Polite, firm, Libby excuses herself and veers off, before Hurley even has a chance to say anything.

As she and Ana talk, Ana stitches up the wound on her forehead. "It won't be long now. I'm gonna find out where Cindy and the kids are. Then we're outta here."

It must have just dawned on Ana what's troubling Libby. Ana looks over to the beach, where Hurley stands all at loose ends. "He'll get over you."

Libby hopes so. But Hurley isn't the only thing troubling her. "Ana, let's just leave."

"We can't right now. That bastard is almost gonna spill, I know it."

"Could I at least try-"

"No. I don't want you around that animal. Look, Libby, let me do my job. Just let me do my fucking job."

* * *

Libby doesn't know why she's accepted Hurley's awkward, stumbling invitation to "go on a picnic." Some of it is that she really does trust him not to bother her. Some of it also involves spite towards Ana, who's so stubborn in refusing her help.

Deep down, Libby knows that Ana's wrong. No matter what the prisoner in the Hatch has done, he's still a human being. Sure, he hit Ana, but he's the one locked up, not her. Of course he's going to try to escape, to get back to his people.

It's just ridiculous. It has to stop, before somebody gets killed.

This all goes through her mind as she and Hurley walk in circles in the woods, looking for the path to what he promises is "this really awesome beach."

It reminds her of something, of this stupid cartoon she used to watch at Santa Rosa when she was medded out of her skull. Round and round her thoughts go

_like wheels within wheels_

_the rec room at Santa Rosa is open to everyone, but television is a privilege_

_if you eat, Libby, you can watch television_

_she sits on one of the big TV room couches wearing a jagged Haldol smile_

_Brooks has won on meds, but he hasn't yet won on making Libby eat_

_he just thinks he has_

_her chewed-up slice of toast sits in a paper cup, slid under a rec-room table_

_so she gets to watch TV_

_it's the Flintstones, running in circles, wheels turning without any motive power_

_endless repetition_

_like a perpetual motion machine in hell_

_then he comes in with two other guys, plops down on the other couch_

_so fat _

_belly bounces when he sits down_

_wears a plaid bathrobe over mismatched plaid pajamas_

_all three guys shriek with laughter_

_his hair shorter than now, but still wildly fuzzy_

_Fred Flintstone drives around over and over_

_she remembers a line from somewhere, can't think of where_

_hell is repetition_

_hell_

_she's in hell because that's him stumbling along up ahead of her, through the jungle_

_him from the hospital_

He's lying about how he broke his hip. He's as bad as she is. At least the part about watching _The Flintstones_ is true.

Libby remembers. And wishes she hadn't.

* * *

She can't go through with it. He's sweet, so full of boyish anticipation (_has he ever been kissed, before her? ever even gone on a date?_) but it's not going to work.

Sooner or later he'll recollect, just as she has. Then she'll see the same horror and shame in his eyes that she feels right now.

She smiles while he babbles. Anything to distract him, to buy some time.

The Hatch. She'll go to the Hatch. There are back-packs at the Hatch, supplies. She and Ana can just grab what they need, and go.

If she can send Hurley off to get some wine, Rose or Bernard will probably snag him in a conversation. That'll buy her at least 20 minutes, half an hour at most, in case he decides to follow her.

She's already thought this through. If Ana refuses to go, Libby will threaten to leave her. Sure, Ana might not back down. She could say, _Just go, then_.

What Ana doesn't know, though, is that Libby knows where the Line is, that invisible border set up by the other people who live on this Island. Jack thought he was confiding in Kate, but Jack doesn't know how much he is overheard. He treats the people who sit around the beach, poking fires with their sticks, as eyeless and earless lumps.

If Ana refuses her, Libby will go out to the Line herself and plead with the prisoner's people. At least she might be able to find Cindy. Surely they won't deny her that.

All this flies through Libby's mind in a flash. She tells Hurley that she's going to the Hatch for blankets. He's to go get some wine.

Innocently, without guile, he delivers the final blow. "Maybe if I get drunk enough, I'll remember where I know you from."

It takes all her will to plaster a false, reassuring smile on her face. She leaves him standing at the shoreline, and when she peeks behind her, he's talking to Jin, laughing.

As soon as she's out of sight of the beach, she begins to sprint up the well-worn path to the Hatch.

* * *

The Hatch door is unlocked, as always. Libby pushes it open, almost calls out to announce herself, then decides not to. She doesn't want Ana to shut her out.

She wants to give Ana a surprise.

The door swings open, and Libby walks in.

(_the end_)


End file.
